Gov. Deval Patrick announces $52 million in state funding to combat effects of climate change

BOSTON - Gov. Deval Patrick on Tuesday announced $52 million in state funding to help cities and towns combat the effects of climate change.

The single largest piece of the funding will be $40 million in municipal grants given to cities and towns to make their energy infrastructure more resilient using clean energy technology. There will also be $10 million for coastal infrastructure and dam repair and $2 million for a variety of other projects.

Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Richard Sullivan, of Westfield, said the money will be spread out across the state. The grants will be available to cities and towns to develop ways to maintain power and communications at police and fire stations, hospitals, emergency shelters and strategic gas stations.

In addition, in Western Massachusetts money will be used to get baseline data, information about topography and water bodies, that can be used to develop emergency management plans.

"As we've seen in Western Massachusetts, with the tornado and the ice storms, you can have serious weather events across the commonwealth," Sullivan said. "This program is going to be very regionally diverse and will absolutely include work in Western Massachusetts."

The Legislature in 2007 and 2008 passed several bills requiring state government to address climate change by reducing greenhouses gases. Patrick's announcement on Tuesday, which was made at the New England Aquarium in Boston, focused on responding to the effects of climate change by preparing the state's transportation, utilities and other infrastructure to deal with more extreme weather.

Dwayne Breger, director of the division of renewable and alternative energy development at the state's Department of Energy Resources, said the municipal grants will allow cities and towns to tap into existing commercially available technology, including photovoltaics, solar panels and batteries for energy storage, to power emergency services, shelters and elderly housing even if the electrical grid goes down.

The grants will be paid for through payments made by electricity suppliers that do not meet state standards for the use of renewable energy. The coastal upgrades will be paid for through existing capital funding. The remaining $2 million will be part of the governor's 2015 budget proposal.

The state will also hire a state climatologist, who will work at the University of Massachusetts Amherst with the Northeast Climate Science Center. The climatologist will be paid around $100,000, with half the money coming from UMass Amherst and half from the state, Sullivan said. He will study the impacts of climate change and provide information to state agencies and municipalities on preparedness and forecasting.

Other initiatives will be spread across state government. The Department of Public Utilities will work with utilities to make their transmission and distribution services more resilient during storms. The Department of Transportation will assess the vulnerability of its facilities. The Department of Conservation and Recreation will assess which parkways and roadways are susceptible to flooding if the sea level rises. The Department of Public Health will work with local boards of health, and will monitor the rise of diseases that could be attributed to climate-related factors, such as mosquito-borne Eastern Equine Encephalitis.

Patrick said climate change is creating more disruptive weather, which challenges public health and safety and economic vitality. He pointed, for example, to the October 2011 ice storm and the washout of Route 2 in North Adams after Tropical Storm Irene.

"The question is not whether we need to act. We're past that," Patrick said. "The overwhelming judgment of science, some 97 percent of scientists, including many who were once skeptics, has put that question to rest. The world's climate is changing, and human activity is contributing to that change. Massachusetts needs to be ready."

Several state lawmakers spoke out in favor of the plan, as did newly elected Boston Mayor Marty Walsh.

State Sen. Marc Pacheco, a Taunton Democrat who chairs the Senate Committee on Global Warming and Climate Change, pointed to the money that the country has already spent reacting to devastating weather events. "The cost of inaction is far greater than any investment we'll be making here," Pacheco said.

State Sen. Ben Downing, a Pittsfield Democrat and chairman of the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy, said the investments are relevant across the state, whether for coastal towns or for rural towns that could become isolated when a road is washed away.

"At a time where debate in Washington unfortunately has been about if climate change is real or what the impacts would be, we have not stooped to that level," Downing said. "We have here in Massachusetts talked about how we are going to blunt the worst impacts of climate change by investing in clean energy and energy efficiency and creating jobs."